


Father Christmas

by Princess_Pinky



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-26
Updated: 2013-12-31
Packaged: 2018-01-06 06:26:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1103518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Princess_Pinky/pseuds/Princess_Pinky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Companionless, The Doctor travels to the 61st century to spread a little Christmas cheer. However, an old foe has come out to play and this time, it's a family game!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is a plot bunny I've had for a while. I took a Children's Literature course this past semester and wrote a critical analysis paper on Derek Landy's Tenth Doctor and Martha e-book, The Mystery of the Haunted Cottage. Then, for my final project, I asked if I could write a "Twelfth Doctor" story in the style of a "December e-book," since they only did e-books for Doctors (and months) 1-11. She said yes! So yay, fanfiction for my final project, and this is what happened…

_**** _

_**Father Christmas** _

**Chapter One**

It was a lovely color, pink, but that just wasn't Jeff. No, that was entirely inadequate. The Doctor pointed his sonic screwdriver at the perception filter clipped to his waist and gave the gradient a quick buzz. A moment later the velvet hat and suit bled into a decadent red that rivaled that of a poinsettia. He checked his reflection in the view screen and, satisfied, reached for a plush bag crumpled at his boots. The second he picked it up be realized they had a problem.

The Doctor held the bag up to his time rotor, an enormous clear cylinder with six green rods inside that glowed like lightsabers. He turned the bag inside out and fitfully shook it. "Does this look dimentionally transcendental to you? We don't have time for games, Dear. The children are waiting."

The TARDIS answered with a sound like a metal beam resisting the urge to collapse beneath arduous weight.

After a millennia of travel, The Doctor had a pretty good idea of what _that_ meant. He stubbornly aimed his sonic at the bag and waved it in a clockwise motion until his arm grew tired. His latest body just didn't have the dexterity of the previous one. "Fine. Have it your way. I guess I'm going Christmas shopping."

Round lights along the circumference of the console room flashed merrily like a carnival ride.

The Doctor trounced up the ramp leading to the front doors and pulled them inward to make a point. He reached for his key to lock them, but they swung outwards to sting his rear and clambered shut with the beep of an armed car. The Doctor grit his teeth and stumbled into the street.

Solar powered air conditioning units the size of 21st century London double-decker buses combed the cookie crumbling streets. The 61st century marked the second wave of severe solar flare activity that had baked the Earth and caused most humans to take to space only thirty centuries earlier. That was excellent for cold blooded Silurians, but not so much for Humans. Even so, they were a surprisingly resilient race and in sixty-five years they would be up hibernating in their space Ark until Earth proved habitable again.

"No, that's not right," The Doctor muttered. He paused, licked the pad of his right index finger, and waved it back and forth like a radar beacon. "Sixty- _nine_ years." That—whatever _that_ was—and the artificial sun bleached Charlie Brown trees in the shop windows placed him squarely in December 6018. The hologram decorated windows had fallen out of use by this time due to the maintenance costs associated with the contemptuous relationship between technology and the sun.

"Yer gonna die o' heat stroke wearin' that, Mx!"

"Oh?" The Doctor asked. He eyed the young child who had addressed him using the gender neutral alternative—pronounced _mix_ —for Mrs., Ms., Miss, and Mr. that had taken dominance in early 4090s and quickly realized his perception filter was still projecting a Santa Claus costume. "And quite right you are!" He fingered the device on his belt. "Better now?"

"How'd ya do that?!"

"Old trick I learned in Venice. Had to modify it though, it was a bit fishy."

"Don't be shtupid, Venice's been underwater fer cent'ries!"

"Perhaps I'm lying then. Sometimes even I can't tell anymore." The Doctor tipped a nonexistent hat and resumed his stroll to the end of the lane. An air conditioning unit lumbered by and when it had gone he noticed a promising sign: _Sidney's Toy Shoppe_.

The bell above the door chimed. It was hotter inside than it had been outside. A group of porcelain dolls were strategically placed on a shelf just beyond the door and their layered dresses of Victorian lace and Mandarin silk were splotched with yellow as if even they were sweating. Aside from a black shorthair Catkind litter clawing at the screen of a 21st century inspired dog stroller as their father perused a selection of feline jungle gyms.

"Wouldn't go with that one," The Doctor said casually. He pinched at some of the carpeting and pulled out a small clump of beige fibers. "Shoddy materials. Your lot would have it destroyed just as soon as it was out of the wrapping." He waggled his finger at the door of the stroller as he passed and was rewarded with a chorus of mewls.

"You sound like a man who knows his toys." The voice came not from the Catkind father, but from somewhere on the other side of the aisle.

The Doctor followed it around the corner to an old woman that was using an archaic feather duster to whisk the faces of a collection of toy clowns. "Sidney, I presume?"

"Sid," the old woman answered. Her joints made cricket sounds as she stood and smoothed off her mistletoe colored cheongsam, embroidered with thin gold leaves. The Doctor offered his hand. "The Doctor."

Sid smiled, her teeth small and beadlike. "I don't get many doctors. One? Six? Eight, perhaps, in all my years? Never like this though."

"I imagine not," The Doctor replied. He absently thumbed a question mark shaped cufflink on his gray pinstripe suit. "Not much of a shopper, me. But today I came with a list!" He flicked his wrist, revealing his psychic paper that appeared to be nothing more than an inconspicuous leather wallet from the outside.

"Ah!" Sid clasped her hands together. "Quite the list! A family affair?"

The Doctor rubbed his knuckles with his left thumb. "My – my wife…it was something we used to do together."

Sid inclined her head. "Well, the hover scooters are this way and I have the entire Monique collection with the exception of the special editions. I have a room set aside for teddy bears, those will never go out of style–"

"They'll be around 'til the end of the universe."

"–and my comic collection upstairs, under Vinvocci glass."

Toys and books alike found their way into The Doctor's sack, including a cotton candy blue Furby and a robotic Yappy dog The Doctor spotted last minute on his way downstairs after two hours of shopping. He was proud of himself this time around, because many of his former incarnations would have taken double or triple that time. The thought passed through his mind as Sid rang up his purchases. He was staring into the counter display case when he noticed a slim white box. "Is that a Wii?"

"Twenty-first century antique!" Sid replied coolly. She stepped to the display case and massaged the glass with her twiggy fingers. "Are you interested in antiques, Doctor?"

A wave of nostalgia lubricated the words stuck in The Doctor's throat: "Do you have any games? I already have a console."

Sid licked her sandpaper lips. "I may have something. One moment." She picked up The Doctor's intergalactic Visa card before slipping into her back room. "For insurance."

The Doctor admired the Wii, just like the one back in his TARDIS.

Almost like the one back in his TARDIS.

After Amy and Rory had been trapped in 1938 New York, he'd taken the Wii from their house and wired it into the TARDIS circuitry. But he had not played in some time, not since his last tennis match with Clara, just before she told him needed a sabbatical:

_"A sabbatical from Coal Hill?"_

_"That too."_

_"Too? No, that's not what you mean. You want a sabbatical from_ me _. Is it the new face?"_

_"It's not the face. Well, sometimes it's the face." Clara smiled weakly. "The running and saving planets job. I love it, I genuinely do, but I always wanted to travel the world."_

_The Doctor tapped his foot. "We're in a time and space machine."_

_"Independently. When I was a little girl my mother and I used to read her book every night and I dreamed of seeing every place in her book. We always said we'd go together. And then – then she died…and I told myself I would go after I graduated university." Clara hugged the book in question,_ 101 Places to See _, to her chest. "But then the Maitlands needed me. They were there for my father and I when my mum died and I had to return the favor. Then a year later you came along and we've done things—mad, impossible things! Things I'd never give up. I've lived a thousand lives, Doctor. Literally. I don't remember all of them either, but I did it for you. And Angie. Artie. My father. The universe! But now I'd like to do something for me. One-hundred-one places to see, all on Earth, all waiting for me, all on my own."_

_"I see." The Doctor turned his eyes to the fluctuating time rotor. "And when you're done…"_

_"I'll call."_

_He smiled. "Don't forget the postcards."_

_"Perhaps while I'm gone, you might find some time for other things," Clara said. "I'm sure you have at least one book unfinished book on your shelf."_

_The Doctor wrapped his hand around one of the console levers. He listened to the doors shut. He felt the TARDIS vibrate beneath the soles of his shoes. He wasn't ready for light reading._

"Here you are!" Sid announced. She slid a dusty black case into the top of The Doctor's sack.

"How much?"

"It's a gift."

The Doctor arched his right brow. "Oh?"

"Don't act so surprised. Even a toymaker can change the game every now and again."

"Is it violent?"

Sid patted the bloated sack. "It's a _family_ game."

The Doctor slung the sack over his shoulder. "Thank _you_."

"No, Doctor, thank you." Sid pressed the Visa and a receipt into The Doctor's palm. "Come again soon!"

The road back to the TARDIS seemed somehow longer than it had originally. When he arrived, the air conditioning felt like butterfly kisses on The Doctor's sweat stricken neck and face. He dropped the sack at the console and leaned forward, resting his forehead against the cold glass of the time rotor. A ping caught his attention and he realized the Wii game had slipped from the sack onto the grated metal floor.

"What do you say, Dear? One-on-one?" The Doctor cracked open the case and pried the dim silver disc from its setting. It was so old the design on the disc itself had worn off. A part of The Doctor wondered if it would even work. "Only one way to find out!" He slid the disc into the slit of the Wii and glanced at his monitor.

Nothing.

Blackness.

And then…sound?

Yes! A flicker on the screen, as if the content was working its way through the miniscule scratches on the surface of the disc. The Doctor turned up the volume: _ba-da-da-bum, ba-da-da-bum, ba-da-da-bum, oooo-we-oooo!_ As the game loaded, The Doctor slipped his sonic screwdriver into a specially designed Wii controller casing. It made the experience feel more authentic.

"'Choose your player.'" He gave the time rotor a playful slap. "I haven't chosen a player in ages!" But each time he tried to scroll through his selection options, the screen would glitch on the second option and boot him back to the first. "I guess we're playing as female."

The TARDIS returned a metallic hum.

The selection process continued to glitch. "A blonde female." Several clicks later, the game screen was loading again. Painstakingly so. "This might be more trouble than it's worth, Old Girl."

Then there was an image, only a silhouette at first. Next, a Santa hat emerged from the darkness. Finally, a pair of petite arms and a torso fitted in a red shirt holding a box wrapped in Circular Gallifreyan holiday paper and topped with a bushy green bow. And then there was a face.

The Doctor staggered against the console.

"Merry Christmas, Dad!" Jenny removed the lid from the box and tipped it forward, revealing a pulsating vortex.

A glitter whirlwind leapt from the box, through the monitor, and swallowed The Doctor whole.


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this isn’t my favorite chapter because it’s the shortest one, but here it is, apologies that it’s a bit of a weird one.

_**Father Christmas** _

**Chapter Two**

"Cinderella, dressed in yella, went upstairs to kiss a fella. She made a mistake, and kissed a snake, how many Doctors will it take? One, Two, Three, Four—"

_Gray screen, black numbers:_ 4 _. It was a countdown on a television screen, but it was glitching and all around the screen red warning lights were blaring._

_"No, no, no, no, no! What did you do?" Jenny demanded from the pilot seat of her ship. In six years, the ship had never malfunctioned in such a manner. Granted, she hadn't read the manual—no time between all the running—but still, she fancied herself fairly knowledgeable of the ship's workings at this point. "I'm sure the manual's around here somewhere. I'll make you a deal: if we get out of this alive, I'll read it cover to cover!" She yanked back on levers, but the ship continued to nosedive. "A little help, please!"_

_"Crash. Imminent."_

_"Not helping!" Jenny could see the ground fast approaching from the window. If she ran to the back of the ship, she could spare herself a few extra moments of life, but how would that be helpful if death was to come either way?_

_"Crash. Imminent."_

_"Stop saying that! I'm trying to think."_

_"Crash. Imminent."_

"Excuse me," Jenny interrupted. "Can any of you tell me our current position?"

The group of chanting children ignored her.

Jenny looked up and down the street, but her ship was nowhere in sight. She checked herself, only to find that there were no visible injuries. "Hello!"

One jumper clad Silurian girl and one suspenders clad Human boy stood approximately four yards apart, each of their hands coiled around the handles of Double Dutch ropes. A line of children—Plutonians, Time Tots, Sea Devils, Buds of Cheem, Crespeallions—waited their turn. "—Eight, Nine, Ten—"

Jenny moved closer to the game. "Curious," she said softly. Having been artificially created as an adult soldier from Messaline's progenation machine only six years ago, jumping rope rang no bells. Each Child of the Machine had been produced with military knowledge and the physique of a conditioned warrior; as their purpose was to fight and die, extraneous information was not included in their blueprint. Since her genetic donor had left Messaline under the belief that she had died after taking a bullet for him, Jenny had been left to roam the 61st century on her own and was frequently faced with cultures and traditions she knew nothing about.

"—Twelve, Thirteen, Fourteen, Fifteen—"

Jenny studied the maneuvers as the various miniature species wove in and out of the ropes: she couldn't decide if it looked like they were partaking in recreation or a military stratagem. Since they hadn't acknowledged her presence, she pressed the index and middle fingers on each of her hands together like pincers and positioned them just over her teeth at the edge of her tongue, then she blew. The whistle cracked the air, but not one of the children so much as shifted their eyes.

"So either you can't see me or you're taking measures to actively ignore me." Jenny trained her eyes on the ropes as two Koturian girls with pageboy haircuts, the colors of lime and maraschino juices, leapt in and began a wordless show of Pat-a-Cake as they jumped. Between Jenny's built-in dexterity as a Messaline warrior and the high sensory perception and physical endurance afforded to her by her Time Lord genetics, it took a matter of moments for her to assess the velocity she would need to move at to get into and keep pace with the game.

"—Twenty, Twenty-one, Twenty-two—"

A scale slicked child with a conical head threaded into the ropes. It was on the small side, even for an adolescent Draconian.

Jenny backflipped into the fray and mimed the moves of the Draconian. One by one she noticed small eyes settle on her, just as she'd hoped. When her unwitting partner jumped from the ropes, Jenny turned about-face and dropped low to the floor. The children controlling the ropes accommodated her and she performed pushups as she moved her body over the ropes. Showing off was in her genes, but it also proved a tactical advantage on occasions too, such as now, when it was the only way to get the interest of several little someones.

"—Twenty-nine, Thirty, Thirty-one—"

"Now that I've got your attention, I'd like to know where I am."

"You're in the Toyroom," the Silurian girl responded monotonously.

"What's the Toyroom?"

The Human boy smiled in a way that resembled a dog baring its teeth. "A place to play."

"—Thirty-four, Thirty-five, Thirty-six—"

Jenny bounced to her feet, turned again to face the Human boy, and began a one woman version of Pat-a-Cake. "The thing is, I don't do much playing. Wasn't born for it. I prefer adventure to games. How do I leave?"

The Silurian girl's tongue flickered along her reptilian lips. "You win."

The speed of the ropes increased threefold and the children spoke as one: "Or you don't."

"Ah." Jenny yawned and tapped her lips. Her feet continued to spring effortlessly over the ropes. "In that case, what number do I need to win?"

"—Forty-one, Forty-two, Forty-three—"

"If you fall, you lose."

"That doesn't answer my question."

The ropes began to swing faster and faster until the arcs of the ropes looked like the solid beams of a force field. "Sure it does," the Silurian said. "You jump or you lose."

"—Forty-six, Forty-seven, Forty-eight—"

"So this isn't a game so much as it is war? Well, why didn't you say so? Because I am very good at war and I don't intend on becoming your prisoner."

"—Fifty—"

Jenny's arms shot out and grabbed the ropes mid-swing. With angry tugs in opposite directions, she toppled both of the ropers and used one Double Dutch rope each to tie up the naughty children.

"You cheated!"

"How can _I_ be the cheater when it was _you_ who made the game impossible to win?"

"Chea-ter! Chea-ter! Chea-ter!"

Jenny rubbed her temples. "Enough with the chanting already, you sound like drill sergeants."

The Silurian's tongue snaked between her lips and lashed the length of space between herself and Jenny.

A rush of cold air grazed the backs of Jenny's knees as the blue leather of her pants tore open, followed closely by the tongue's whiplash. Her legs buckled and she braced herself with her hands when she fell, fully expecting to skin them on the rough blacktop. Instead, they slid out from under her as if the blacktop was waxed and, for a nanosecond, she thought she saw her own muted reflection in the street. Jenny blinked and the blacktop was just blacktop.

"A basic rule of warfare, Time Lord: know your enemy."

"Time Lord?" Jenny grit her teeth and rolled over to find herself surrounded by the angry children. She touched her hands to her chest and felt the rhythm of the twin beats beneath her shirt. She scowled at the brood. "You're right," she agreed. "I walked, err – jumped, right into this one. Now tell me, why am I really here?"

"What do we do with her?"

"She was naughty," the Bud of Cheem said.

The Time Tot nodded. "She deserves a lump of coal."

"What does coal have to do with anything?"

The Silurian child, free of the Double Dutch rope, strode towards Jenny.

Jenny lifted her shoulders, craned her neck, and flashed a rather doubtful smile as the Silurian's shadow crossed her face. "Rematch?"


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone unfamiliar, ze is a gender neutral term for she or he and zir is a gender neutral term for his or her.

_**Father Christmas** _

**Chapter Three**

Bougainvillea permeated The Doctor's nostrils. His lashes flickered and he awoke to find himself lying on his back, surrounded by bustles of flowers and leaves. He sprang from the lawn and absorbed his surroundings: a whistling pinwheel near a clump of empty terracotta flower pots, a vegetable garden that had yet to sprout, twining grape bushes, and a bridge that arched over a small fishless pond. He was in a garden.

"Don't play games with me!" The Doctor seethed. "Don't _ever_ think you're capable of that. You used my daughter's face in vain and now you're about to find out what a terrible decision that was!"

The last time The Doctor had seen Jenny, she was preserved behind glass like Snow White; she had been time napped by Adam Mitchell and imprisoned in a fortress with almost every companion The Doctor had ever had. The Doctor had nearly taken her then and rewritten history to save her life. Somehow, in the chaos of returning the companions to their rightful time streams, Jenny had been lost to him for a second time.

"Is that a threat, Doctor?"

"Sid!" The Doctor shouted upon hearing the disembodied voice. "What are you playing at?"

"I play at a lot of games, Doctor, you'll have to be more specific. Though, to be fair, I did tell you this game was for family."

The Doctor spun and spun until all he could see were splashes of flowery color amongst the greenery, as though someone had carelessly flung their paint collection unto a green canvas. "Where are you?"

"You have yet to reach that level."

"Face me!"

"Why don't we play a game of Capture the Flag?"

The garden began to transform: a spinning red pinwheel blew over and began to expand until it could fill a moderate living room and then hardened into metal, becoming a twirling roundabout. Empty flower pots reformed into the shapes of a horse and rocket ship and thick, coiled springs emerged from the ground and attached to them, turning them into park toys. The enclosed vegetable garden quickly faded from lush, dark soil into grainy beige beach sand, the grape vines grew with their wooden support beams into metal swing sets, and the ornamental bridge sunk in on itself and stretched like taffy until it had formed into a slide at the center of the pond. There were no stairs to the slide, but at the top was a wooden box, and within the box sat a plastic toy soldier—Jenny.

"What have you done to her?" The words left The Doctor's mouth before he had time to wonder if it really was Jenny, once again plucked out of time, or if it was another illusion wearing his daughter's face.

"She's been a very naughty girl. She cheated," Sid's voice said simply. "She cheated and therefore she lost. But I am willing to give her another chance. She'll replace our flag and if you can get to her without getting captured yourself, I'm willing to give her a rematch."

"A rematch," The Doctor spat. "I know who you are."

"I was so hoping that you would." Leaves shivered and fell off a nearby tree as Sid's laugh echoed across the garden. "Let the games commence!"

The _Mario Kart_ kick start pinged and Sid was gone.

The Doctor surveyed the landscape: even ignoring the issue of the ladderless slide, a mad dash to the pond was simply out of the question. Indeed, Sid was much cleverer than that, which meant booby traps at the very minimum. The Doctor took a tentative step forward, moving at the speed of cold molasses. Nothing had jumped out at him yet, nor had the floor collapsed beneath him. He took another step and then another. A plan was slowly knitting together in his mind's eye.

"Comin' through!"

A fiery sensation rippled across The Doctor's lower leg. He instinctively attempted to step away from a Big Wheel Trike that had mysteriously appeared on the garden path and plowed into his shin at the command of the Human boy in suspenders, but the child propelled the tricycle over his shoes and the gnashing pain sent The Doctor sprawling backwards onto the endless roundabout. Colors began to bleed together like a runny watercolor painting and The Doctor's nose and throat wetted with nausea.

The Doctor clamped his eyes shut to the spinning world around him and blindly patted around until he felt one of the metal poles that were meant to be held on to. He hauled himself to his stinging feet and used one foot to feel for the edge of the roundabout. When he found it, he moved as close to the edge as possible, counted to three, and threw himself forward.

_Unf!_

When the nausea had waned, The Doctor opened his eyes again and realized in dismay that he was further away from the pond than when he'd started. In fact, he was lying in between the springy toy horse and rocket ship. The Doctor reached for the floppy reign on the side of the horse's plastic mouth and realized his mistake the moment the leather touched his fingers.

The toy horse began to rock violently to and fro, causing the ground to crack and sputter beneath it. The horse's shiny cream soda colored nose and tail grew brown as its face smacked into the dirt and flung backwards, endlessly seesawing until the ground gave way and released its hold on the spring.

"Bloody toys!" The Doctor cursed. He ducked and rolled into the trampled earth that the toy had just broken free of. The rocking horse fell from the sky with the intent to spring onto The Doctor's face. The ground audibly cracked beside him, leaving a deep spiral scar. The Doctor scrambled to his feet and began to run. Tricycle trampled feet or no, he was very good at the running.

Behind him, the earth shrieked again as the rocket ship coil also freed itself and combined forces with the rocking horse in their attempt to cream The Doctor.

The Doctor paused to catch his breath on the garden path. He heard the _tha-rump_ , _tha-rump_ of the springs beating the ground and soon they were joined by the telltale grind of three wheels. He waited until the last possible second and sidestepped the Big Wheel. "Mind if I borrow this?" The Doctor picked up the little boy by the crossing X of the suspenders on his back and dangled the kicking child with one arm and grabbed the Big Wheel by the left handlebar with the other.

_Tha-rump!_

_Tha-rump!_

The Doctor angled the Big Wheel, arched back, and flung the trike into the rocket ship as it attempted to pounce. The force of the impact sent the rocket ship into a literal tailspin and it crashed into the rocking horse, entangling their respective springs. Both promptly fell to the ground with a resounding _THA-RUMP!_

"And that's nothing," The Doctor bragged. "You should've seen what I did with a cricket ball in nineteen-thirteen. Now, what to do with you?" He sniffed the child. "You don't smell Human. Or Time Lord. Or even Koturian. But you do have a…plasticky air about you." The Doctor wrinkled his nose. "Fresh out of the box, by the smell of it. Very lifelike though, a commendable job on the craftswomanship."

"Let! Me! Go!"

"Gladly." The Doctor carried the child over to the rolling spring toys and used the child's suspender straps to knot him to the already tangled springs. When the boy was secure, The Doctor dusted off his hands and strode toward the swing set. The five-and-a-half feet there were surprisingly uneventful.

And then the chains began to swing.

"I thought you might feel that way." The Doctor plopped himself down in the seat of the swing and started to pump his legs. The chains hissed and The Doctor pumped faster until his feet no longer touched the ground. The support beams groaned and The Doctor swung until each time he flew back his sight was at level with the bars. Suddenly the chains cracked and The Doctor billowed through the air, his fists still clenched around the swing chains.

_Shhhplat!_

Triumphantly, The Doctor's head emerged from the water and he doggie paddled around to the edge of the slide where he pulled himself up and struggled to stay on the slide with his slick, dripping attire. He balanced himself with his left hand and with his right he began to spin the end of his swing chain. When it had built up enough momentum he cast it like a fishing pole and it fell around the beam of wood above the top of the slide opening. The Doctor fed the chain down until the seat of the swing formed a C against the beam, leaving the swing chains to dangle down the length of the slide. Slowly but surely The Doctor used the chains to crawl his way up the slide. He was panting by the time he made it into the box.

There, within finger's reach, was Jenny.

Or what _looked_ like her.

Sid wasn't the first being who had tried to trick him by dangling the carrot of those he'd lost before him. He was sure she wouldn't be the last, either.

Softly, The Doctor cupped Jenny's army green cheek. There was a sound in the air like sparkles and The Doctor felt Jenny's jaw unhinge as she sucked in an audible breath. Color replaced the green of her face.

Jenny's first instinct was to karate chop the hand on her face, but as she moved to do exactly that, her eyes caught a pair of fierce gray ones staring at her. In all her six years of existence, she had never seen that ovular face before, but something inside her chimed like an old Grandfather clock and she knew, just as she had when she'd emerged from the progenation machine, who the eyes belonged to. "Dad!"

Before The Doctor could respond, he found Jenny's arms around his neck and his face smothered with her fluttery blonde ponytail. The aroma seeped deep into his lungs; the smell of time. "Jenny?" he wheezed, fearful that if he returned the hug she might evaporate.

"I've been looking for you for such a long time!"

"But this is impossible."

"Not impossible, just a bit unlikely."

"But you died."

Jenny shook her head. "The breath of life."

"What?"

"The Messaline creation myth: 'In the beginning the Great One breathed life into the universe and then She looked at what She'd done and She sighed.' Dad, that's what happened to me! I just breathed and it was golden and beautiful, like The Source. But they said you and Donna and Martha had already left."

"The breath of life." The Doctor stepped back from Jenny and carefully pressed his palms to her chest.

Jenny mirrored the gesture.

Beneath the fabric of her army shirt, beneath the skin, the muscle, the blood, the bones, there were dual vibrations.

"Two hearts," Jenny whispered.

The Doctor felt his eyes grow hot. "Two hearts. But you didn't regenerate. No! Of course you didn't regenerate, you weren't done yet! I should have stayed, I should have waited. But I left you, I–"

Jenny shook her head. "You're here now."

The Doctor picked Jenny off her feet and spun her around. "You're right! And this time I'm not

leaving without you."

"Which begs the question: how, exactly, do we leave?"

The wooden box around them splintered away and a gush of water appeared under their feet, sweeping them down the slide.

_ShhhPLAT!_

"I'm too old for water parks," The Doctor complained.

"What's a water park?" They doggie paddled their way to the edge of the pond and Jenny offered her hand to help haul her father to his feet.

"You've got a lot to learn."

"Starting with that."

The Doctor followed Jenny's line of vision. "Run!"

Without thinking, Jenny reached for The Doctor's hand and they began to run, mirroring each other's steps like the doubles in Double Dutch. In unison they hopped over the edge of the sandbox and dropped to their stomachs as a yellow beam sparked over their heads, singeing a few strands of Jenny's hair. She crinkled her nose at the smell.

"That's a Sea Devil," The Doctor explained. "Amphibious creatures."

"Ah, that's why it walked out of the pond."

"But it's probably not. It's probably just an imitation of a Sea Devil in the same way that the Human boy I saw earlier was an imitation of a Human boy."

"Suspenders?"

"How did you know?"

"We played a game together. There were ropes. And jumping."

"You mean jump rope?" The Doctor deadpanned.

"That would make sense. Anyway, that one was there too. Only ze didn't have a weapon at the time."

Another beam whizzed above their heads.

"Dad?"

"Shh! I'm thinking."

"Yeah, sorry to interrupt, but I believe that beam was further away from my hair than it was the last time."

"This is not the time to be worrying about your hair, Jenny. Priorities!"

Jenny scowled. "I mean that it singed my hair last time. If the Sea Devil was coming closer to us, wouldn't zir accuracy be better, not worse?"

_"Oh."_

Jenny nodded. "Yeah…"

The Doctor shifted his eyes down and realized they were sinking.

"I know this one!" Jenny said proudly. "We had this on Messaline: quicksand."


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I didn't get this chapter up yesterday.

_**Father Christmas** _

**Chapter Four**

Jenny sat up and wiped two globs of quicksand off her face. She was now in a yellow wallpapered room beside her father. They had fallen from what she could only conclude to have been a portal within the quicksand, because they'd come through the ceiling and landed on the floor. "Just out of curiosity, since I've never experienced it, is that what being born feels like?"

The Doctor opened his mouth and quickly shut it. He raised a gloopy index finger. "Whatever answer I could possibly give to that question would be the wrong one. After we get out of here, we'll drop in on Martha. She's a doctor—and I think she and Mickey have a son now, too—so you can talk to her about that."

"Speaking of here," Jenny said. "Where _is_ here?" She turned in a circle, noting a fireplace lined with five stockings. The names scrawled across them: _The Doctor_ , _Jenny_ , _Joe_ , _Monique_ , and _Teddy_.

The Doctor peeled off his suit jacket and shook it, splattering a nearby dollhouse with quicksand freckles.

"Before, during the jumping rope, the kids told me I was in the Toyroom. I don't even know how I got here. One minute I'm putting a DVD into my ship's drive and the next minute I'm waking up to 'Cinderella dressed in yella.'"

The Doctor stared at the ceiling. "Oh, that's cute."

"What?"

"It's an old jump rope rhyme from Earth. Where we are decidedly not. And you probably got here the same way I did." The Doctor pointed to the ceiling, where they had fallen through the quicksand. "A portal. We're in another dimension."

"Very good, Doctor!" Sid's voice echoed.

"Did it take you long to rebuild after Charley and I were here last?" The Doctor taunted.

Sid materialized before The Doctor, a sneer on her lips. "I think it turned out rather well, don't you? I hope you and the progeny like it, because you won't be leaving."

"New body too." The Doctor walked a circle around Sid.

"I could say the same about you."

"Weren't you a man the last time I saw you?"

"I'm a Guardian of Time, I have no sex."

"Now there's a game you're missing out on. But I'm not here to judge. In fact, I'd rather not be here at all, so why don't you just let Jenny and I go and skip all that rubbish falling action. We all know I'm going to defeat you in the end anyway. How many times have I done so already? One? Six? Eight?"

"Dad?"

"Apologies. I don't think you were properly introduced, were you, Jenny? Jenny, Toymaker. Toymaker, Jenny. But you already know that, don't you? How did you find out about Jenny in the first place?"

Sid's teeth glinted in the fluorescent light. "I watched you abandon her on Messaline, of course. I can see everything from the Toyroom."

"You just can't survive for long outside of it."

"Long enough," Sid said. "Long enough to plant the traps that got you here, Doctor. Oh, _Doctor_ : an idol for children because he's nothing more than a child inside himself."

"I fail to see the downside."

"Dad!"

The Doctor turned at the sound of Jenny's rising intonation. He noticed that the dollhouse had sprung up to three times its original size and the door handle was turning. "Expecting guests?"

"Poooooor Jenny," Sid singsonged. "Born a woman; born a soldier. Nary a time for childhood. Perhaps you'd like to make that up to her now? Say, with a tea party?" Sid tapped her palm and the doll house door burst open, revealing an array of life sized toys.

A G.I. Joe charged through, carrying a round table above his head.

A Monique Superstar Doll draped with a lavender duffle bag walked out behind the G.I. Joe and used the duffle bag as an oblong wrecking ball to pop The Doctor in the side of the head.

Joe placed the table before Sid and charged back into the doll house, returning with a stack of chairs.

Meanwhile, Jenny took up a fighting stance and landed a series of roundhouse kicks into the belly of a teddy bear, but they seemed to be having little effect. Finally, Teddy grabbed Jenny by the ankle and flipped her over zir shoulder. Jenny swung her free leg around Teddy's neck in an effective headlock, but being a teddy bear, the lack of oxygen that would normally be inflicted on someone who relied on breathing proved futile on a stuffed animal.

Sid sat down at the table while Joe arranged tea cups at the empty place settings. She lifted the kettle and poured Jenny an imaginary drink while Teddy secured Jenny in a chair. "Cream or sugar?"

Monique lugged the unconscious Doctor into a too-small seat between his daughter and the Toymaker. She dropped the weighty bag into his lap and unzipped it to reveal an array of costumes.

"Are you familiar with dress up, Jenny?" Sid asked.

"No, but by the look of the contents of that bag, there is a high probability I'm going to hate it."

Monique pulled out a dusty green velvet top hat and sat it on The Doctor's head.

While Monique rummaged, Sid stood up and moved to the fireplace. She lifted the stocking labeled Jenny off the hook, returned to the table, and tossed it over to Jenny's place setting. A black chunk rolled out between the lips of the stocking and fell messily into Jenny's lap. Sid sipped her imaginary tea. "Do you know what that is?"

"Coal."

"Allow me to rephrase: do you understand what it means?"

Jenny shook her head.

"Once a year children on Earth are said to receive coal if they've been very, very naughty."

"Because I 'cheated'? Well if I get coal, what, pray tell, do you get?"

Sid laughed into her tea cup.

The Doctor came to again sometime later. By then, the life sized toys were gone.

"Nice of you to finally join the party," Sid said.

The Doctor narrowed his eyes at Jenny. "Are you—"

"Held captive in blue and white frills? Why, yes, yes I am."

"I was going to say dressed like Alice, but yes, yes you are."

"Who's Alice?"

The Doctor groaned. "To-Do List: fairytales. Maybe we'll drop by and see Lewis too? Interesting bloke. We once had a scintillating conversation about Constantine."

"I know who Constantine is."

"Finally."

Jenny glared.

The Doctor returned his attention to Sid. "Is this what you've been reduced to? Dress up and tea parties?"

"What are you insinuating, Doctor?"

"It's not very imaginative, is it? Need I even point out the rampant clichés?"

"You know what I don't understand?" Jenny asked. "The point of bringing someone somewhere for the sole purpose of holding them captive. What benefit do you get out of watching someone else be miserable?"

"It's not about the misery, Jenny. Sometimes one needs a change of pace. It's about the adrenaline; the vicarious rush. When you live as long as I do, there comes a time when you need someone else to live for you." Sid twisted her head towards The Doctor. "You know what it feels like to be boxed in, don't you, Doctor?"

"I was 'boxed in' on Gallifrey. The TARDIS gave me freedom."

"And yet here you are, always hungry for a new companion to help you see the mystery of the universe again."

"But I don't keep them against their will."

"Anymore," Sid corrected.

"Barbara and Ian were exceptions. Initially. And stop turning to turn the tables, that was an entirely different situation. I didn't even want them in the TARDIS to begin with!"

Jenny's face perked. "Dad."

"What?"

"Turn the table."

"It's an expression, Jenny. It means—" The Doctor side eyed Sid. "Turn the table!"

"Exactly!" Jenny thrust her legs under the table in time with The Doctor. The force flipped the table along with the tea set toppling onto Sid. Jenny then stomped her feet on the floor and began to rock her chair until it would teeter on its hind legs and fall forward again. Three times she tested the strength it took to balance the chair and finally she pushed it back with so much force it flipped Jenny onto her back, crushing the chair between her weight and the smack of the impact. Jenny hopped up, her hands still tied behind her back with a Double Dutch jump rope—poetic justice, Sid had called it—and crossed over to her father. "I hope you have a battle plan that follows this because I'm out."

"I usually just make it up as I go along, so why don't we worry about getting ourselves untied first?"

"Right."

"Over here, over here," The Doctor said. He ushered Jenny against the yellow wall and angled his hip against the hands held behind Jenny's back. "Feel for the button and press it."

"Why?"

"Trust me!"

Jenny nodded and felt for anything button-like. When she pressed it, nothing seemed to happen. "I don't think it—"

"Shh!" The Doctor whispered. He pressed his mouth to her ear. "Perception filter. If it works, we'll have blended in with the wall like chameleons. Everyone sees what they expect to see and just a smidge of what we want them to see."

Dazed, Sid crawled out from under the shattered remnants of her tea time and thumped her hands together, summoning Monique, Teddy, and Joe from the dollhouse. "Find them!"

Jenny craned her neck to smile at her father.

Sid flung her arm upwards, sending Teddy, Joe, and Monique into the ceiling, presumably by way of the portal through which Jenny and The Doctor had originally arrived. Moments later, Sid herself was gone.

"Well, that bought us time," The Doctor whispered.

"Why are we still whispering?"

"We're in a dimension where toys come to life. You never know," he said, eyeing the shattered tea set. "The Dish and the Spoon might tattle on us." At Jenny's confused look, The Doctor bopped her nose. "I know, I know, you'll understand that reference later."

"Before, on Messaline, you said you had a ship. Do you know where it is?"

"The sixty-first century, last I checked. I'm not sure how we get back there though. Usually the Celestial Toymaker gives us a game or a riddle that you have to win in order to destroy the Toyroom. Usually she—or he—ze, designs them as unwinnable, at least for most people, and once you lose you become a toy in zir Toyroom."

"But ze's been playing games that aren't really win or lose."

"Yes, it seems ze has learned a thing or two since our previous encounters."

Jenny knelt down beside the broken tea set, turned her head to look over her shoulder, and picked up a sliver of shattered China. She began to try and slice the jump rope binding her wrists behind her back, but only ended up nicking fingers and further breaking the shard in the process.

"That's never going to work," The Doctor stated unhelpfully.

"Then what will?"

The Doctor narrowed his eyes at the white apron on Jenny's Alice costume. "What's that?"

Jenny looked down and noted the dark stain on the pocket. "Piece of coal. Apparently I've been a bad, bad girl." She noticed a stricken look in her father's eyes for a nanosecond and then it was gone.

"I have an idea."

"Finally."

The Doctor glared. "Stop that. Now turn. Turn, _turn_ ," The Doctor repeated until Jenny turned so that her hands were to his chest. "Now, feel for my inner breast pocket. It's bigger on the inside."

Jenny grunted as her muscles stretched against their nature, searching for something she couldn't even see.

"What you're looking for will feel like a long rectangle with a string on the end and buttons on one side. Pull it out."

A few minutes later Jenny felt a string and her fingers followed it up to something hard and rectangular. She pulled out whatever it was.

"Wonderful! Now hand it to me." The Doctor turned his back to Jenny and felt for the object in her hands. There was a buzz and a moment later The Doctor flexed his wrists. "There we are! Now, your turn." He pointed his Wii remote at Jenny's wrists, it buzzed, and the jump rope fell away.

"How'd you do that?"

The Doctor grinned and opened the back panel of the remote. "Sonic screwdriver. Sonic waves loosen the stability of the ropes and viola!"

"A screwdriver?"

"I originally thought it up to build cabinets. Don't judge!"

"How do you go from cabinet building to rope removal?"

"If Humans can turn their cell phones into miniature camcorders and Internet browsers, I can have a rope removing screwdriver, thank you."

Jenny shrugged and began to remove the Alice costume Teddy had forced her into. Once she was down to the hoop skirt, she fought with the knot until the hoop fell into a circle on the floor. Jenny stepped over it and bent down to give it a closer inspection. "People didn't actually wear these, did they?"

"Still do. We'll have to go to a Con sometime, you'd be surprised."

"A Con?" Jenny cocked her head as her father rattled off an explanation involving the word _convention_ , but all she could think of was a _con job_. She suddenly looked at her nicked up hands and thought of the blacktop that _should_ have torn up her skin. Jenny wiped the ground outside the hoop of the skirt and then wiped the circle of ground within the perimeter of the hoop. "How did you say those perception filters work again?"

"Everyone sees what they expect to see."

"And just a smidge of what we want them to see?"

"Exactly."

"Do they ever fail?"

"Occasionally. Like in water, but I waterproofed mine. Why?"

"Because if this is carpet, then why can I see my reflection in it?"

The Doctor dropped to Jenny's side and stared at the spot on the carpet that she was examining.

"The same thing happened back in the park when I fell on the ground. But only for a moment."

"Oh," The Doctor grinned. "That's new."

"Explain?"

The Doctor waved his sonic over the area and a patch of the carpet faded away to reveal a shimmery disc. "Ze rebuilt the Toyroom on a disc. Literally _on_ the disc; the surface of the disc! An entire dimension on a disc! It's a Discworld. Terry would be so proud."

"That's why the DVD was a portal."

"And the Wii game," The Doctor agreed.

"Very good, Doctor." Sid materialized beside the doll house. "A perception filter. Very clever, but now that the charm's worn off I'm afraid it's no longer going to do you any good."

The Doctor unhinged the perception filter from his belt and tossed it to Sid. "We've discovered yours as well, Toymaker."

Jenny looked at her reflection on the floor, then her eyes wandered to the apron. She suddenly grabbed it, pulled the chunk of coal from the pocket, and rolled it between his palms. She locked eyes with her dad. "Looks like the pressure's on now. Wouldn't want to make this situation worse by…" She shrugged. "Making _waves_?"

Sid waved zir arm and a shelf identical to the one from the Toy Shoppe, complete with the yellow stained porcelain faced dolls, materialized along the wall. "All toys must be shelved at some point."

"I like to think I still have some shelf life," The Doctor quipped. He lifted his arm into the air just in time to catch the coal that Jenny pitched to him and immediately turned his sonic to it. "You know what happens to coal under pressure? And I don't mean the type of pressure where you're trying to maintain your autonomy whilst someone else is attempting to lock you away in their toy box. I'm talking about the kind that normally takes millions of years but that I'm using high pressured sonic waves to simulate in twelve seconds!"

"Your point, Doctor?"

The Doctor tossed the lump to Jenny.

Except, when Jenny opened her hands, the lump was no longer black, but clear. "Right here!" She tapped the topmost point of the diamond with her index finger.

"A diamond, how lovely," Sid said. "But unfortunately I'm not that kind of girl."

"Oh," The Doctor frowned. "I'm afraid you have the wrong impression. I'm already taken. However—"

"It'll look wonderful on my shelf," Sid interjected. "Right alongside you both."

"About that…" The Doctor held up his sonic and the screws holding up the shelf spiraled out of the wall and the shelf promptly collapsed.

"My antiques!" Sid raised zir arms and summoned the shattered dolls to zir.

"I'd be more worried about the disc if I were you. They're such temperamental pieces of technology."

Jenny nodded. "I would hate to find out what would happen if one was…" Jenny squatted and pressed the point of the diamond to the floor. "…scratched."

"No, don't!"

The Doctor grabbed hold of Jenny's free hand while she carved the diamond into the floor.

A glittering vortex infused the cracks, sucking the pair in.

The last thing Sid saw before the portal closed were the words illuminated by the glow of the vortex: _GAME OVER!_


End file.
